Falalalalala Fully Funded!

We are thrilled to announce that our adoption is FULLY FUNDED!! Every dollar we need to bring our little one home has been given to us from our faithful and generous God and we are overwhelmed with gratefulness.

It has been 15 months since we started this journey of adoption and 14 of those months have been spent in some form of fundraising. We never dreamed we would be fully funded before receiving a match but God knows what we need and is so good to give us more than we ask or imagine.

So what does this mean for Standard Goods? We are going to continue working in our little leather shop to help cover the un-forseen costs we know will arise (things like increased airfare, medical needs, upgrading our hotel room in China, a new stroller, etc.).  We will no longer be promoting the shop as a means of raising funds for our adoption but will be giving a percentage of sales each month to loving and serving the needs of orphans and widows in our community and around the world.

We want to thank the many, many friends and family members who have given towards our adoption. We've received countless cards with checks and anonymous "gifts" in envelopes over the last year. Our matching grant was met within weeks of announcing it and events like the Adoption Banquet at Radiant, the fireworks booth in July, and the Handmade Holiday sale were huge in helping bring in the funds needed. Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone involved in helping bring our baby home.

We serve a mighty God who is a father to the fatherless. Stay tuned over the next couple of weeks...there is more news coming soon!!

The Ugly and Honest Truth

So it has been a while since I've updated the ol' blog. Excuse #1 is that we've been swamped with Standard Goods. We had two big events in the same week and so every spare moment of the last month has been filled with cutting, oiling, sewing, and prepping leather pieces.

"Tastemakers" at the Rawhide Stadium

Makers Market at Embellish and Restore in Downtown Visalia, Oct. 14th

Excuse #2 is that I haven't really wanted to write anything...the ugly truth. As of today we've been waiting 59 days for a match. Back in August when we were getting ready to send our dossier to China, we had heard that the wait time for a match was 2-3 weeks from the date the paperwork was logged. In my head and my heart I was really sure we would have a match by the end of September and maybe even be able to travel sometime in December. Three weeks stretched to four and then five and then six and now we are starting our ninth week of waiting. I kinda hate it.

When I was 38 weeks pregnant with Sawyer I remember my doc telling me that my baby was "going to come any day now." I waited until almost a full 41 weeks to meet our firstborn. Those three weeks of waiting were torturous. The excitement paired with fear that came with each twinge or cramp or braxton hicks drove both Tim and I crazy. I feel like I'm right back at those three anxiety wrought weeks. Every time my phone rings my heart stops just a bit wondering if it's our social worker calling to tell us about our son or daughter. It is a crazy and weird emotional roller coaster that I know will eventually end on a high note but, until then, leaves me spinning.

I've even been "nesting." We completely rearranged the kids' rooms to accommodate for the soon-to-arrive brother or sister. I'm telling you, we are so ready to have a name and face and a gender and an age to miss and dream of and long for rather then just the title of "our China baby."

All this to say that every time I've thought to myself, "Hmmm, I should really update the blog today" the thought was closely followed by, "I don't want to write an update titled "No News Whatsoever." This train of thought resulted in almost five weeks of blog nothingness. So there it is. The ugly and honest truth about Tuesday in the Kanallakan's adoption journey. Prayers appreciated as we meander through this phase of waiting and hoping and dreading another day of no phone calls.

Our leather stuff is pretty cool though, eh? :)

We're Almost There...

God is good. So good. 

Ok, before you read any further, look to the right of the screen and notice how much we've raised and how much is left. Our current deficit is $9000. Remember that number as you read this letter that we will be mailing out to friends and family next week. 

Nine thousand. 

Nine thousand.

Ok, now check this out. I know its long, but please read it all :)

September 7, 2014

Dear Family and Friends,

About two years ago, we began to sense God inviting us into the adventure of growing our family through international adoption.  During our early months of prayer and research, our eyes were opened to the vast number of orphans with special needs, waiting for a forever family. As we sought the Lord’s direction for our adoption, we felt very strongly that we were to use the gifts and talents God had given Tim as a Prosthetist /Orthotist to love and care for a child with limb difference (missing a leg or arm, etc.).  We continued to pray about where this particular special need was greatest and the Lord lead us to China. We believe our son or daughter is waiting for us there.

After 12 months of intense paperwork and fundraising, we are close to seeing this dream and calling become reality. On Aug. 20^th of this year, our application to The People’s Republic of China was received and accepted and we are now waiting to be matched with our son or daughter. We anticipate this match to happen very soon and pray that we will be traveling to China to bring our child home as early as January of 2015.

International adoption is costly and risky on many fronts. Because we are confident that we are walking in God’s calling on our family, we do not fear the “unknowns” ahead of us. We know that God is with us and will provide for our needs as a couple, as parents, and as a family with a special needs child from another country. Sawyer and Jane are very aware of our decision to grow our family in this way and are thrilled and anxious to meet their new sibling and will love them well. It is awesome to witness the love that is growing in all of our hearts for this family member who we have yet to meet but who we all miss and long for deeply.

We estimate that bringing our child home will cost around $30,000. We have spent the last 12 months working hard to raise these needed funds. In October of last year we launched our handmade leather goods shop, “Standard Goods: Leather and Tools, Co.” and have made and sold over 500 leather pieces, made at our dining room table. All sales have gone directly towards our adoption savings fund. We have hosted garage sales, managed and manned a fireworks booth, and helped lead the facilitating of our church’s annual “Adoption Celebration” dinner which raises money for adopting families.

In total, through our Standard Goods sales and other fundraising efforts, along with the generous donations of a few close friends and family members, we have raised about $21,000 towards our $30,000 estimated total cost. This accomplishment is nothing short of miraculous and we are beyond grateful for God’s faithfulness.

A few weeks ago, we received the incredible gift of a $4500 “Adoption Matching Grant” from our Radiant Church family via the non-profit ministry of Lifesong for Orphans. This grant will be matched dollar for dollar to help pay our remaining adoption expenses.  We would like to invite you into being a part of our new child’s adoption story. 

Would you pray about partnering with us in bringing our child home? Our goal date is October 30^th, but funds will be accepted towards our adoption until our child is home and/or our adoption is complete.

Please make checks payable to “Lifesong for Orphans.” In the memo note our family name and account number: Kanallakan/#4734 to assure the funds go towards the correct account. Please mail to:

Lifesong for Orphans

PO Box 40

Gridley, IL 61744

Lifesong has been blessed with a partner that underwrites all US administrative and fundraising costs (TMG Foundation and other partners) and 100% of your donation will go directly to the adoption.

Another option is to give online. Our family blog is www.dadwillbuildyourleg.blogspot.com and along with updates on our adoption adventure, there is a PayPal donation button set up with a direct link to our Lifesong account.

You can also visit: www.lifesongfororphans.org/give/donate and select “Give to an Adopting Family.” Simply complete the online form and fill in family name and number fields with: Kanallakan/#4734.

In following IRS guidelines, your donation is to the named non-profit organization. This organization retains full discretion over its use, but intends to honor the donors suggested use. Individual donations of $250 or more and yearly donations totaling $250 or more will receive a tax deductible receipt. Receipts for donations under $250 will gladly be sent upon request. Lifesong is a 501(c)3 tax exempt organization.

Thank you for your prayer and support. Your investment will help change not only the earthly life of a child but will advance the Kingdom as we raise our new son or daughter in the knowledge of their Heavenly Father who has never left them and loves them dearly. Please pray that as we get closer and closer to China that God will continue to prepare not only our hearts, but our new child’s heart for the redemptive story that awaits.

Blessings,

Tim, Amber, Sawyer and Jane Kanallakan

Whew!! Now, just in case you've forgotten, we have $9000 left to raise in order to be fully funded. I know it's Friday but do a little math with me. Because our grant is a matching grant it means all funds donated will be automatically doubled. 

$4500 plus $4500 equals: FULLY FUNDED!! 

We are overwhelmed with how God has provided for our adoption and super excited to see how He brings us to the finish line with the gift of this matching grant! 

As mentioned in the letter, if you would like to give, there are a few ways to donate towards our final push in being fully funded. We have set up a PayPal button here on the blog that is directly connected to our Lifesong account as well as included the link to Lifesongs website where you can use our family name and account number with your gift. 

Also, we would LOVE to mail you a copy of our family letter, along with an endorsement letter from Lifesong and a family photo for your fridge to serve as a reminder to pray for us. Just email us your mailing address at akanallakan@gmail.com and we'll send the packet next week. 

This 12 month journey has been one of ups and downs, highs and lows, and lots and lots of prayer. We know we have only seen the tip of the iceberg and that the true challenges lie ahead, but God has given us a gift of faith during these months of working and fundraising and we are believing that our adoption fund will be full by Nov.1st. Will you join us and pray in agreement towards this goal? 

I keep thinking about Jesus talking to his friends about the birds of the air and the lilies of the field and how much God delights in taking care of them. We have felt the delight of the Lord as we have seen Him provide the money needed to bring our child home. He has taken such good care of us and we are overwhelmed. 

Thank you to our friends and family for praying for us, for contending with us, for standing in a hot fireworks booth with us, for donating baskets to the Adoption Banquet, for babysitting our kids while we worked on paperwork, and the million of other ways you have loved us on this first leg of our adventure to China. 

We're almost there... 

Standard Goods Giveaway: Handmade Leather Guitar Strap

If you are not currently following us on Instagram, grab your phone and get on it! Our name is @standard_goods and we post regular updates on both our adoption adventure and our Standard Goods shop. This week we have an awesome giveaway happening so don't miss out! Giveaways are a great opportunity for us to not only drum up business, but also spread the word about our shop and our adoption story. Winner will be selected on Friday so hurry and enter today!

30 and Waiting...

Today is August 21st and I have been 30 for two whole days! 30 has been the magic number for so long it is surreal to finally have arrived. China would not accept our dossier until both Tim and I were 30 so we've been holding onto our documents and counting down the days. Since our agency only sends dossier's to China on Friday, our initial plan was to have everything sent out on the 22nd (tomorrow), which is the Friday following my birthday.

Let me back up a bit...

Our first dossier goal was to have all our documents state certified by July 23rd. So, on Wednesday, July 23rd, my friend Monica (a fellow "waiting momma" with twin kiddos in Haiti) and I jumped into our mini van and road tripped it up to Sacramento to get 'er done.

I had assumed the certification process would take a while. I was sure there would be one or two documents that I missed a signature or dated it wrong or was notarized incorrectly or something so we identified the nearest UPS with an available notary to fix any issues that would come up and headed into the Secretary of States office to start the process. I took a number (though there was only one other person waiting at the time we arrived) and sat down. Three minutes later I was handing my documents over to be certified and was told to sit down and wait. Eight minutes after sitting down, I was told my documents were ready and have a nice day. What? Seriously? No issues? No re-do's? No "run to the notary next door and get this taken care of and then come back"? Nope. We were done. After just about four hours in the car, we spent maybe a total of fifteen minutes in the Sec. of States office before we were done. And just like that, we had all of our documents state certified by our goal of July 23rd!

 And since July 23rd was our ninth anniversary, we celebrated it the next day with a night out in the big city of Fresno.

With our documents now State Certified, the next step was to send them to the Chinese Consulate in San Francisco to be Authenticated. Since this was not something we could road trip to make happen, we UPS'd our documents to the Consulate and were told to wait up to three weeks to get them back. Again, we were kinda expecting something to go wrong and prepping our selves to need to re-do a document or two. I mailed our dossier to San Francisco on July 25th and we had everything back, no issues, completely authenticated (with a super rad Chinese stamp) on August 7th. I spent most of the next day copying, scanning, and emailing everything to our agency. On Monday, August 11th, we sent every last document to our agency for final review.

On the 13th our agency received our dossier. On the 14th it was approved. And on the 15th, one week earlier then we had been praying for, our dossier was on a plane to China. Because it would take a few days of travel, our agency felt comfortable sending it out before my 30th birthday. We haven't received an official word yet, but it is most likely that our dossier was logged in with The People's Republic of China this past Tuesday, the 19th, my 30th birthday.

So what now? Now we begin to play "the waiting game." We have done all the paperwork we can do for now and it is all out of our hands. Now that our dossier is logged in and I am 30, we are eligible to be matched with any child fitting our profile. This means I am checking my phone and email often. Really often. Waiting to hear from our social worker who will give us our referral. It could happen this afternoon. It could happen tomorrow. It could happen next week or next month.

Don't get me wrong, we're not just twiddling our thumbs while we wait. As you can see from our little fundraising thermometer on the side of the blog, our estimated expenses have gone up a bit due to a recent increase in fees from our agency. However, you should also notice our amount fund raised has increased a lot as well which is super encouraging and faith building. So, since we still have a bit of a deficit, we are working hard at our Standard Goods business and cranking out the leather works. Our Etsy shop stays consistently busy and we've signed up for three fall "craft fairs" where we will be selling our goods to hopefully make a nice dent in the deficit. We have also applied for a grant and are hoping to hear more details on that soon. Once we receive and accept a referral, we will need to pay a fee of $15,000 so we are hustling to ensure we can write that check as soon as we see our little one's face. Lord, let it be soon!!

A huge "thank you" to those of you who have been praying for us during the paperwork process. We've felt your prayers and cherish the encouragement you've been to our family. We're getting close and the support we have from our friends and family makes it so much less scary and so much more exciting.

How cool would it be if my next update post is news that we've been matched with a child!?!! 

June-July Update: Foster Youth Graduation, Adoption Celebration, Car Accident, Fireworks Booth, Dossier Prep...Nap.

So the last four weeks have been a bit insane. "A bit" is an understatement. Super-duper insane is more accurate. As you can see from the title of this post, we have had our hands full with some pretty intense events.

Here's the recap:

Foster Youth Graduation

As the Program Coordinator for City Without Orphans, Tulare County, I get to do some really cool things with some super cool people. Case in point = Attend the ILP Foster Youth Graduation Dinner with thousands of dollars worth of donated raffle prizes in hand.

Each year the Tulare County Independent Living Program (ILP) hosts a graduation dinner for foster youth who have completed high school. Traditionally, there is a raffle but this year, due to budget cuts, the county did not have the funds to purchase the prizes. Three local churches stepped up and committed to providing the raffle gifts. The county couldn't believe the generosity of the faith community and the value/quality of the gifts. Not only were there 15 rad raffle prizes, but each graduate was given a devotional and $50 Target gift card as well.

It was such a great event and so fun to get to be the hands and feet of Jesus to these amazing and deserving kids.

Adoption Celebration and Banquet

 June 22nd was our church's 2nd annual Adoption Celebration and Banquet and, just like last year, we SOLD OUT! We had over 90 items and services donated for our raffle and silent auction and had to combine many of the donations so that it would all fit on the 20 plus tables we set up. We enjoyed an evening of delicious food, Hutsells Homemade ice cream (if you are in the Valley you HAVE to try their ice cream!!), amazing raffle and auction prizes, and, last but not least, the wonderful Gospel Whiskey Runner's concert. It was a fabulous evening, with our final amount raised of $17,775! These funds will be divided between our church's Lifesong for Orphans account (to be available in the form of grants for our adopting families) and our "Post-Adoption Support" fund. 

Some of our amazing donated raffle items. 

Tables, linens, chairs, decor = all donated!!

The Lord brought the masses! Every seat filled!!

Tim and our dear friend, Deborah, selling raffle tickets.

The amazing banner made by Kim Rico. The perfect theme for this adoption process. 

We are so grateful for all the volunteers who donated countless hours helping organize the event and the over 250 people who attended and celebrated with us. So, so blessed the generosity of our church family.

Car Accident

Just a few days after the wrapping up the banquet and before launching into the fireworks booth, I was picking up Tim from work (because our Pilot was at the transmission repair shop...yea.) when we were hit by another driver. Though all the people involved were ok, our car was not. The front left tire took the brunt of the impact and the axle was broken as a result. The car was towed from the scene and later pronounced "totaled." Since our Pilot was still in the shop, we had a day or two as a "no car" family until we could pick up a rental and snag the Pilot back (unfixed) from the transmission shop. The rental is now returned, the insurance check has been cashed, and we are living life as a "one car" family as we search for vehicle number two.

Fireworks Booth

I spent much of May and June prepping to sell fireworks. Having never grown up in a city where street fireworks were legal, it was a whole new world for me. Our church recently merged with another church who had dibbs on a fireworks booth. The city of Visalia only allows 27 fireworks booths so there is 12 year wait to work one. One of our pastor's generously offered the booth to the three families of our church adopting internationally as a means of fundraising. We all eagerly jumped in, knowing that this was a huge opportunity to make some money. Because none of us had every managed a fireworks booth, we had little to no idea of how much work was actually involved. Let me put it this way, we sold over $29,000 worth of fireworks in 4 days and we earned every. single. penny. Of course, the week of July 1st through the 4th was record breaking heat. Sitting in a plywood box on top of asphalt in 107 degree heat is not something your average person would volunteer for, but guess what? We had over 36 volunteers over the four days who did just that. Many of the volunteers I had never even met before and there they were, sweating next to me, so I could get money to bring my baby home from China. What a gift. What a picture of the body of Christ.

Unpacking 2000lbs of fireworks.

Setting up the booth.

Ready to sell!!

The Lord showed us so much favor through the entire process. Our original location fell through and so we scrambled to find a spot for the booth. We landed in a Walmart parking lot. FAVOR. When the fire marshall came to approve our set up, he asked me how in the world we landed in such an amazing location. I think he called it "prime." He was right. By 6:30 pm on the 4th we had SOLD OUT. Completely cleared the booth of all fireworks except a few bricks of Ground Blooms. The next morning when Tim and I went to our drop off appointment, the fireworks crews couldn't believe we were only returning a single box. FAVOR.

S O L D  O U T!!

We are still calculating expenses and sales tax but we are hoping that each of the three families will be able to walk away with about $4000 from the fireworks booth. So much work. So worth it.

As if the sweet location, amazing volunteers, and incredible selling out of fireworks wasnt enough blessing, God had the wife of a local news channel drive by our booth and call her husband to tell him to share our story. On Friday morning ABC 30 showed up and did a great spot on our fundraiser. Follow the link to check it out:

http://abc30.com/157897/

Nap

With the past few weeks being as crazy as they were, we are now finally entering what feels like "summer vacation." The kids are enjoying VBS and swim lessons this week, I actually went grocery shopping, and our laundry is getting washed AND folded!

As far as the adoption paperwork goes, we are hoping to have all of our dossier documents completed and notarized ($10 per signature) by July 23rd (our 9 year anniversary) and will then mail them off to be state certified ($20 each document) and then mail them off again to be authorized by the Chinese Consulate ($25 each document). Our prayer is that every step will go smoothly and we will be ready to send it to our agency in the first week of August and they will be ready to mail it to China on August 22, the Friday after my 30th birthday!!!

Please join us in thanking God for the amazing ways He continues to provide the finances for this adoption. He is so faithful. Every check we've written has had the cash in our adoption savings account to back it up. Pray that our faith would continue to increase as we watch our Father provide.

Also, please pray that all the final details needed in finalizing our dossier would fall into place so that we are ready to send everything to China mid-August.

Lastly, pray that we find a car soon. Tim has been diligently searching, test driving, and praying for the exact car that the Lord has picked out for our soon-to-be family of five. With three car seats in our near future, a mini-van is on our radar. Pray that we would be wise in making the purchase... and that our Pilot's transmission would be healed.

God could do that, you know :).

June Update: Home Study Approved

Holy smokes batman, it's been a long time since I've posted an update! Where do I even start...Excuse me while I scroll through instagram to remember what the last 8 weeks have looked liked.

Our biggest accomplishment in the last month was (drum roll please) completing our home study!! We are now an approved adoptive family and can be matched with a child from our agency's special needs listing. Did you read that?? We are now waiting for a phone call or email from our social worker with a name, photo, and medical info of our son or daughter!! The call could come later today or it might not come till September. For now, we just wait on God's perfect timing.

Standard Goods, our Etsy shop, has really taken off these past few weeks. We were so excited to be featured on Etsy's home page for a bit and that really drove traffic to our store and revved up our sales. Tim and I spend most every evening now cutting, oiling, and sewing leather goods. When we launched our lil' etsy shop back in October, our goal was to earn $5000 by the time we submitted our dossier in August. If sales continue at their current pace, we are estimating our total sales to be close to $8000. WE ARE OVERWHELMED by the favor God has shown us in this venture. Tim and I often joke about the reality that we are working to fund this adoption through making purses and dog collars. Never in a million years...

We recently sent off a few of the largest checks I've ever written to our agency. It is so awesome to have the money in our savings account to back up those checks. Even now, as the account begins to dwindle, we have such confidence that when the next payment is due, the money will be there. This process has been such a faith builder for our entire family. It is not uncommon for the kids and I to get the mail and for them to ask, "Is God mailing us money today?" I love that at ages 3 and 5 they already have such a testimony of God as a good provider.

Our dear friend and incredible photographer, Kelli Avila, blessed us with some adoption photos for us to use in sharing our story. I love them all so much!

To our son or daughter in China, 

We are working so hard to bring you home!! See you soon!

April Update

Ready for another update?

Makers Market

We had a great day selling our Standard Goods pieces along side other great, local artisans at the Embellish & Restore Makers Market. We sold over $450 worth of our leather goods and made some great connections which we are hoping will grow into other fundraising opportunities.

Homestudy Paperwork

We finished our homestudy paperwork and mailed it, along with a $2900 check to our agency!! We have scheduled our first Home visit for next week and hope to have our homestudy approved by May. There are a bunch of grants we are wanting to apply for (and maybe a Kickstart-ish campaign) but we've been waiting until our homestudy is done and approved to apply. Pray it all continues to move forward smoothly and quickly!

Beach Day

Between adoption paperwork, Standard Goods, and life in general, we've been pretty swamped. Last Saturday was supposed to be another super busy day but after a series of unrelated events, all the busyness was canceled and our day totally opened up. What do you do with a free day? Go to the beach, of course!! 

House Prep

We really have no clue when child #3 will be home. It could be nine months, it could be twelve months.  But we know they are coming and we know we need to be prepared. With our first home visit coming up in a few days, we started to have a more serious conversation about bedrooms/beds/cribs etc. Because we don't know the age or gender of our child yet, it is all one big guessing game. We had moved the guest room bed into Jane's room to create space for our Standard Goods workshop. Though Jane loved having the huge bed in her room, it took up tons of space and made it really difficult  for her to play in her room. A few nights ago, Tim and I started talking about looking for a trundle bed for her room to create space for her and allow for an additional bed, in case we are matched with a sweet girl. It was a super fun conversation and reminded me of the chats we would have during my pregnancies as we would dream about nursery decor, baby names, and wonder if the baby was a boy or girl. 

24 hours after having the bed conversation, I was looking on craigslist and found an ad that had just been placed for a gorgeous daybed with a trundle for an incredible price. We picked it up last night and the kids have been playing on it and in Jane's room all day! 

It has been so fun to do some type of "nesting" as we prep for our adoption. There is so much more to be done and so much we can't do until we have a match but the simple action of buying a bed with a second bed in anticipation of what might be, definitely upped the level of excitement in our house!

Prayer Requests and Darling Magazine Feature

I kinda feel like I've been hit by two trucks. One truck was made out of feathers and marshmallows and the second truck was carrying cattle or something. Seriously, as the work load continues to increase with Standard Goods and our adoption paperwork, God's blessings continue to increase as well. Both hit hard, one is just way more fun to collide with than the other. All that being said, we could use prayer!  

How to Pray: 

• We are SO close to being done with our home study. We are just waiting on getting a few papers back from our doctors and then need to finish our personal applications. I was actually about 80% done with the 22 page personal app when my computer lost it's mind and lost my work. So there went about 10 hours of thinking and typing down the toilet. Fun. Pray that we would continue to maintain a good pace with our paperwork and that no more time would be wasted due to technology. Pray that the paperwork being filled out by our doctors would be done correctly and quickly so we can get our home study approved and begin to apply for grants. 
• Our sewing machine is still not working at 100% so Tim is having to drive to the "on loan" machine to sew our leather pieces at night. Such a bummer and hassle and waste of time he could be spending home. Pray that we would figure out what is going on with our machine and have the time to fix it.
• Pray that we would gain wisdom and discernment for managing this new small business God has given us in Standard Goods. As the business grows and the orders pile up, we need to know how to best allocate our time and our resources to maintain a steady flow of sales but also to keep from burning out.
• Pray for our baby in China. Pray that they are safe and being loved well while we work and fight hard to bring them home. 

A HUGE Praise:

Tim and I are being featured this week at Darling Magazine as their "Embodied: Courageous" story! I LOVE Darling Magazine and am still in a bit of shock that they are sharing our adventure with their readers. It is a bit dream like, for sure. These interviews and blog spots and shop features are such great exposure for not only our story but in raising awareness of the need for adoptive families. Opportunities like the Darling interview are always such a gift to our family and, we hope, help to encourage others to consider what God might be calling them into in regards to loving the fatherless. 

Be sure to check out the interview and leave a comment on the story!

Homestudy Update, Kate and Linny Deals, and Rags to Stitches Feature

We are off and running with our Homestudy!! After six months of waiting, it feels so good to finally be able to fill out paperwork (Though I know I probably won't be saying that for long).  These last few weeks have been a bit of a blur so I wanted to write it all down to make sure I don't forget a single detail :).

As of this weekend we are about 80% done with the paperwork side of our Homestudy. Our physicals are scheduled for this week and we're waiting for certified copies of our birth certificates and marriage license to come via snail mail. The parent training modules are actually really interesting and we're hoping to have all of our courses done by the end of this week. That leaves the personal application- a 22 page document full of questions about our family, marriage, childhood, faith, etc. It is pretty intense and requires a lot of quite time to think and then articulate those thoughts. Since "a lot of quite time" doesn't really exist in our house, this part of the Homestudy seems to be taking the longest...

Our goal is to have our Homestudy mailed out to our agency by mid-April. We are also trying to chip away at pieces of our Dossier as well, though that list will require at least 4 chalkboards to display. Geez Loueez.

On the fundraising side of things, we are BLOWN AWAY but the sales we continue to have at Standard Goods. Seriously, we thought our little leather shop would be a fun way to raise money during the holiday season but God definitely had other plans. Our leather goods are now on display at two local boutiques in Visalia, have been a featured deal on Brickyard Buffalo, and have been shipped to 35 states!!

BUT WAIT-THERE'S MORE...

This week we have two HUGE events going on for Standard Goods that we are hoping everyone will check out:

1. A handful of our products will be featured at Kate and Linny at discounted prices. Kate and Linny is a fabulous new online pop-up shop and the ladies running the show have been incredibly encouraging and gracious to us in wanting to share our shop and our story. 

2. I am being featured as the "Mompreneur of the week" at Kate and Linny. Head over to their blog to read my interview! 

3. Alissa at Rags to Stitches is featuring our story and highlighting our leather clutch on her blog today! You've got to see her beautiful pictures and read her sweet words about our adoption adventure. 

Rags to Stitches: A Style Worth Adopting

We are seriously so overwhelmed by the opportunities God is putting before us to share our products and our story and bring in the funds we need to bring our baby home. 

I am so excited to announce that as of this month, we are MORE THAN HALF WAY FUNDED!! 

Praise God from whom ALL blessings flow!!